Breakdown of De houten vaten zijn uit het grote schip gevallen.
zijn
to be
groot
big
uit
out of / from
vallen
to fall
Questions & Answers about De houten vaten zijn uit het grote schip gevallen.
Why is the plural of vat written as vaten with a single t?
The singular noun vat (barrel) has a short vowel sound. However, it belongs to a special group of irregular nouns that shift to a long vowel sound in the plural. To spell this long 'a' sound in an open syllable, Dutch uses one a and one t, making it vaten. If it were a regular noun, it would be vatten to keep the short 'a', but here the sound itself changes.
The lesson is about irregular plurals. How does schip fit into this?
In this sentence, schip is singular ('the big ship'). But it is a perfect example of an irregular plural for your current lesson! If there were multiple ships, the vowel would change completely from a short 'i' to a long 'e', making the plural schepen.
Why is it houten vaten and not houte vaten? Does the adjective get an -en ending because vaten is plural?
No, the ending isn't because of the plural noun. In Dutch, adjectives that describe what a material is made of (like wood, gold, or wool) almost always end in -en. So 'wooden' is always houten, whether the following noun is singular, plural, a de-word, or a het-word.
Why is groot spelled as grote with only one o?